Editor’s Note: This is the first in a new series of posts highlighting interesting funders that are on our radar, including key details on how they operate and what they’re up to right now.
What this funder cares about
This one’s pretty easy: southeast Michigan and western New York. This foundation isn’t one to spread its grants all over the country—it keeps things laser-focused on the needs of its home region’s post-industrial legacy cities. For instance? Jumpstarting flagging economies and workforces, and caring for older adults. But looking at the numbers, what the foundation calls “active lifestyles” commands much of its attention. It’s really into programs that encourage youth participation in sports and recreation, and has an extensive commitment to parks, trails and other green infrastructure projects.
Why you should care
Together with its regional focus, this foundation’s size gives it plenty of clout in the places where it works. Assets exceed $1.2 billion, and that’s not all. This is a legacy funder, but it’s not a perpetual one. The plan is to spend down by 2035. In 2019, grants totaled around $118 million, exceeding the 5% minimum payout by a comfortable margin. Though its grantmaking might seem eclectic at first glance, a quality-of-life approach to region-specific challenges serves as connective tissue. So does a range of partners like community foundations and other intermediary funders, which the foundation relies on heavily as it moves money out the door.
Where the money comes from
Ralph C. Wilson, Jr. was a businessman, investor and sports executive who founded and owned the Buffalo Bills. When Wilson passed in 2014, the Bills were sold for $1.4 billion. Wilson had instructed that the bulk of that sum go to his posthumous philanthropy, and that’s how a $5 million foundation magically became a $1 billion one overnight. Wilson also stipulated a 20-year grantmaking window and picked four “life trustees” to help set the foundation’s direction. Heading the staff is President and CEO David Egner, the longtime leader of the Hudson-Webber Foundation.
Even though this foundation is still the new kid on the block in many ways, time passes quickly. As Egner and board chairman Eugene Driker put it, the whistle has already sounded on the foundation’s first quarter.
Where the money goes
First off, almost no funding leaves southeast Michigan or western New York, so fundraisers eyeing Wilson cash would best be working in a number of specific counties there. This funder also tends to prefer larger, more well-established partners—including intermediary funders—but also encourages new ideas and experimental approaches.
Starting with the end in mind guides this funder’s approach—it’s big on coalition-building and collaborative work that it hopes will live past the foundation’s expiration date. In fact, its dedication to the region’s nonprofits has inspired an entire funding initiative for nonprofit capacity building.
In line with Wilson’s interests and those of the trustees, “active lifestyles” grants have so far made up the bulk of the foundation’s grantmaking: a full 62% during the period extending from 2015 through 2019.
In addition to its regular grants, the foundation offers support via several legacy funds hosted at local partners like the Community Foundation for Southeast Michigan, the Community Foundation for Greater Buffalo and the Rochester Area Community Foundation. Grantmaking through the legacy funds largely reflects the parent foundation’s interests.
Open door or barbed wire?
This foundation accepts applications on an ongoing basis throughout the year, so we’re off to a good start. Grantseekers should check out information on how to apply on the foundation’s website, which serves as the first stop in an online application process. A sortable list of existing grants can be found here, and information on staff and governance can be found here, although background on non-executive staff is pretty sparse. Beyond their names, the website contains no information on the trustees at all.
A report on the foundation’s activities through 2019 provides relatively up-to-date financials, grantmaking totals and good insight into what kinds of grantees the foundation likes. An earlier report on the foundation’s activities from 2016 through 2018 gives similar insight into this funder’s first several years.
However, given the foundation’s spend-down plans, it would be nice to have more info on exactly how it intends to ramp up its grantmaking to burn through an endowment that hasn’t really shrunk since 2015.
Recent updates
The foundation maintains a “what’s new” section on its website, mostly made up of funding news. A lot of what’s there pertains to the foundation’s parks and recreation funding; for instance, the formal launch of a $10 million conservancy to support a reworking of Buffalo’s former LaSalle Park (now called the Ralph C. Wilson, Jr. Centennial Park).
The foundation’s also backing an interesting participatory grantmaking project called Generator Z. Launched late in 2020, the program invited 1,000 young people aged 13 to 18 to share their ideas on afterschool programming. The foundation then asked afterschool providers to apply for grants based on the teens’ ideas, with the youth themselves serving as judges. And the foundation paid the young “Generators” for their expertise—$1,000 each, totaling $1 million. The plan is to move $4 million to afterschool programs, on top of what the Generators got.
One cool thing to know
In the fall of 2018, to honor the centennial of Wilson’s birth, the foundation committed $100 million apiece to create parks in Detroit and Buffalo. The plan in both cities is to reboot waterfront areas with new green spaces and trail systems. There’s plenty to like about these partnership-intensive projects, including the foundation’s reliance on community outreach.
The parks have also been great conduits for additional support from other sources, including the public coffers and the trusts of Wilson’s own late daughters. The foundation’s parks funding sits at the nexus of outcomes local funders often prize, including health and wellness, urban social cohesion and even economic vitality.
Where it should go next
This is less a matter of should and more a matter of must—give more. The year 2025 will mark halftime for Wilson’s 20-year spend-down plan, and as of 2021, investment gains have wholly made up for grant outlays, significant as those have been. The pandemic, a racial justice reckoning and other 2020-era considerations have no doubt affected the foundation’s developing plans, but a ramp-up should be on its way soon.
Since this is a regional funder working around the post-industrial Great Lakes, we also might be tempted to put forward the Mott Foundation’s dubious results in Flint, Michigan, as a cautionary tale. But funding for causes like parks, youth recreation and elder care isn’t as easily “canceled out” by nation-level setbacks like recessions and pandemics.
On the other hand, things like workforce development and entrepreneurship initiatives do face that danger. The foundation hasn’t really supplemented that side of its work with policy funding to get at root issues that extend beyond the region, but affect it nonetheless.